Decrescendo
by Chibi Scissorwoman
Summary: Thirteen band students face a turbulent school year in which the bonds of their friendship are stressed. Rated T just to be safe. I suck at summaries. The story's better. Please R&R! CHAPTER 3 NOW UP!
1. Chapter 1

_Beep! Beep! Beep! Beep!_  
5:00 am. Morticia climbed out of her bed and stalked over to her alarm clock, groaning as she punched the button to turn off the alarm. Stretching, she turned on her light and sat back on her bed, squinting in the brightness. She was _tired_... maybe going to bed at 11:30 last night wasn't the brightest idea...  
She sat there, wondering why on earth she had gotten up so early. Her gaze landed on her clarinet in its case, and she remembered: Only one event would pull her out of her nocturnal summer lifestyle. Only one day would ruin her routine for the next nine months... Tuesday, August 21: The first day of her high school sophomore year. "Aw, crap," she muttered. She got up, crossed to her dresser, and began pulling clothes out.  
It took her a while to get dressed, but finally, she was wearing her black sweater over a navy blue three-quarter-sleeve shirt, dark denim pants, and black sneakers. By now she was mostly awake, and she suddenly remembered her schedule.  
"Damn it... bleeding honors classes," she said. Five of her classes this year were honors classes... everything except band, Cisco Networking, and lunch. She hadn't wanted to take any honors except English 10 and Italian II... but, typical of her mother, she hadn't been listened to, and she'd been forced into the others... even geometry. Morticia was _horrid_ at math... she'd had to take algebra I twice, once in eighth grade and once last year, and she'd barely passed both with low D's. She had always had issues in math... it was like there was a wall there, preventing her from understanding any of it.  
She suddenly broke away from her thoughts and looked at her clock. It displayed 6:01 am, and she stood up. She'd been sitting there thinking for a half-hour! She slung her backpack on her back, picked up her clarinet, and picked up her black mp3 player from her desk. The thing was a piece of crap, but it'd work.  
"Morticia Hawkeye," she said, putting in her earbuds and turning the player on, "time to conquer sophomore year." She pushed play, and Evanescence began blaring in her ears. The song was Lacrymosa, from the band's sophomore album, The Open Door. Morticia enjoyed the irony of the situation. She softly began singing as she left the house. She hopped off the bus, withdrawing her schedule from her jacket pocket and reading it. First class of the day: concert band. This should be fun.  
"Yo! Hawkeye!" called a voice behind her. Morticia turned to see a girl clad in a dark blue T-shirt and baggy goth pants walking up to her. She was twirling a drumstick in her hand... and looking quite proud of herself.  
"Hey, Katrina," Morticia replied. Katrina Bukater: Sixteen years old, one of only two girls on the drumline, and a freshman. They had met at band camp during the last week of summer, and Katrina had said that she was supposed to be a sophomore, but got held back in third grade because she had missed over half the year and failed every subject.  
"What'd you think of the routine we learned?" Katrina asked her.  
"I liked it; it's a little complicated, but I'll get it," Morticia answered.  
"You are so lucky to have band first hour," said Katrina.  
"Why, what's your first class?" asked Morticia.  
"English 9." Katrina grimaced. "I _hate_ English. I don't have drumline until fourth hour. Once pep band season starts, I'm switching first and fourth hours so I can play the drum set."  
"Nice," said Morticia. "You love the drum set, don't you?"  
"You bet!" Katrina exclaimed. "Drummer for life, girl!" She was silent a moment as they walked into the main building. "Okay, I'm going to go find my crew. See ya, Hawkeye!"  
"Later," said Morticia. Katrina wandered away, still twirling her drumsticks. Morticia stepped into a hallway, and when she reached a plain white door, went into the room.  
A cloud of cacophony met her ears as she shut the door of the band room. Everyone had their instruments out already and were all playing; some were playing the drill music they'd all been given at band camp, others were either tuning or playing random songs. Morticia smiled. _Now_ she was home. She had been in JROTC last year, because of her mother, but this year she had gone back to band. She had felt so alienated and stupid in JROTC, because of her personality... but as she listened to the chaos, she felt as if she was part of a massive, dedicated army. An army of band geeks. An army of dedicated band geeks, and she was proud to be a part of it.  
As she walked towards the clarinet section, she surveyed the room. A senior, Leilani Featherflame, was sitting with the saxophones, although she was technically orchestra. She was going to carry the banner during marching season. Senior Takenaga Yamaguchi was sitting in the back with his section, playing various scales on his trombone. Senior Caitlin Lavandeira, the head and only female drum major, was talking to the band director, Mr. Kyran, outside of his office. Junior Demetra Symbrasia was sitting at the piano, playing a few bars of Beethoven.  
Morticia took her seat in the clarinets, and proceeded to assemble her instrument. Sticking the reed in her mouth to moisten it, she put the mouthpiece on the body of her clarinet.  
"Morticia!" said a voice. Morticia looked up into the vivid emerald green eyes of her section's field assistant, seventeen-year-old Kaolin Riverwing.  
"Yeah?" Morticia asked, her speech slurred by the reed. "What's up?"  
"Glad to see you joined the band this year!" said Kaolin. "I saw you at band camp last year, but I got a little confused when I didn't see you in the actual class!"  
"Yep," said Morticia. "I've come back to my band geekiness ways!" Kaolin smiled.  
"I'm happy for you!" she said.  
"Where's Amarante?" Morticia asked, naming their section leader.   
"Amarante's not going to be here until the week after next," Kaolin replied. "She's in Louisiana and got held up there. So, I'm going to be section leader until she gets back!" Morticia nodded and fitted the reed to her mouthpiece. She then played the B flat major scale in both octaves, finishing with a trill in the higher octave. Kaolin smiled again.  
"Good sound," she said. "Just a tiny bit flat, though. Play a G for me." Morticia did as told, and Kaolin said, "Okay... push the barrel all the way in." The sophomore pulled the barrel down as far as it would go and played another G. Kaolin listened for a bit and then gave her the thumbs-up. She then returned to her seat at the end of the row and picked up her alto clarinet.  
A few minutes later, Caitlin Lavandeira stepped in front of the class. She wasn't that tall, maybe five-foot-two at most, but she had an air of authority. She suddenly clapped her hands and yelled, "Band, atten-hut!"  
"Go!" the members cried as they silenced and snapped their instruments to the attention position. Mr. Kyran, a tall man with dark brown hair, stood behind the director's stand.  
"Welcome to band," he said. "You've all made yourselves a part of a wonderful group. Be prepared to work your butts off this year, but have fun at the same time. Just remember... if it was easy, everyone would do it. Caitlin, start with Maximum Strength Warmup."

She nodded. "Come on, Demetra," she said. "I know you don't want to, but you have to play your piccolo." Demetra scowled, returned to the flutes, and quickly assembled her piccolo. Caitlin said, "Okay, since almost all of you were at band camp, there shouldn't be too many people without the music. If you don't have it, look off your neighbor's. Let's go!" Morticia dug in her backpack for her flip book, and when she found it, she placed it on the music stand in front of her. Caitlin raised her hands, and everyone lifted their instruments. She snapped her fingers. "One! Two! One, two, ready, and!"  
One of the other drum majors hummed the drum introduction for two measures, and then the band began to play. Morticia concentrated on the notes. Half note, half note, quarter note... now a set of chromatic eighth notes! This song was rather fun...  
The song ended several moments later, on a high G for the clarinets. Caitlin signaled the cutoff, and the room silenced.  
"That was a good cutoff," said Mr. Kyran. "Section leaders, see who needs music in your section. Daniel..." He turned to a redhaired drum major. "Hand out the music. At ease!"  
"Okay, who all needs music?" Kaolin called, standing up and looking down the row. Three hands shot up, and she said, "Hey, Daniel! We need two second clarinets and a first!"  
"All right," said Daniel, thumbing through the copies of music. The theme for this year's field show was Danny Elfman, so they were playing different pieces by him. They had one long piece of music, called Music for a Darkened Theater, made of different excerpts from movies he had written music for. Morticia's favorite and best-played piece was This is Halloween, from the movie The Nightmare Before Christmas. It was the second song in Music for a Darkened Theater, and she loved it to death. She hadn't seen Nightmare Before Christmas yet, though.  
"Okay, everyone, let's run through Insects," said Caitlin suddenly. "That's all we've got time for, so make it good!" Morticia flipped to the song. The clarinets had six measures of rest at the beginning, then a joined eighth-sixteenth note. This song was _so_ easy... she could almost roll her eyes at the simplicity.  
Caitlin counted it off and started conducting, and the band began playing. The clarinets soon began to play at the right measure for once, and the song was finished in a couple of minutes. Caitlin signaled another cutoff, and Mr. Kyran said, "Pretty good, but there's a lot of work that needs to be done on that. Prepare to be on the field tomorrow! Okay, clean up, have a good day!"  
Talking filled the room as everyone began to put their instruments away. Morticia reached under her chair for her clarinet case and began dismantling her instrument.  
"Hey, Morticia!" said a voice. She looked behind her, shutting her case, and saw tall junior Edward Sarukian looking at her, his alto saxophone still together.   
"Edward," she said.  
"Have I ever told you you have a weird name?" asked Edward. _"Morticia?_ I mean, what kind of a name is _that?_ You _really_ want to be like Morticia Addams?"  
"What kind of name is Edward Hohenheim?" Morticia countered, smiling. "It's just like Edward Elric! Alphonse's like Alphonse Elric!"  
"What about me?" Edward's younger brother, Alphonse, looked up from his seat where he was quickly polishing his tuba.  
"I was just talking about how you guys are like the Elric brothers," said Morticia. "You two are the Fullmetal Alchemist brothers of band!"  
"I'll take that as a compliment," Alphonse said. He smiled and placed his tuba on the cabinet. "Though I don't know what Ed thinks. He _hates_ Fullmetal Alchemist."  
"It's stupid," Edward confirmed. "It's even worse because _you're_ obsessed with it, Al." He strode back to his seat and took apart his saxophone. Morticia, her backpack on her back, put her clarinet in the cabinet and walked to the door with Alphonse.  
"Oh, you know you love it, Fullmetal," she said teasingly. He looked up.  
_"Hey!"_ he said. "Don't call me Fullmetal!" Morticia smiled and giggled, then left the band room. Off to honors geometry!


	2. Chapter 2

**A/N: Guess what? Chappy 2 is up!! Yay! I finally finished... lots of dialogue to write! But... finally... it's done, and it's updated! Enjoy! Please R&R, as always. **_**  
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_**Chapter Two**_

She sighed as she stood in line. Thank God... it was lunch hour. Sixth hour was currently her favorite time of the day (besides band, of course). Morticia mentally ran through her morning schedule: First hour was band, which spoke for itself. Second hour was honors geometry. The only person she really knew in that class was Kieran Alysatrian, a freshman she'd met at band camp. He played electric bass guitar and was going to help carry the banner in marching season, but he'd missed band today because he accidentally overslept.

Third hour was Cisco Networking. It'd only been the first day, but Morticia already wanted to switch out. The class in itself was incredibly boring, she was the only girl in there, and everyone else were seniors that she didn't know. Fourth hour chemistry class she had with Demetra, and they'd watched a video because they had had a substitute. Finally, in fifth hour English honors, she had had Alphonse in there, as well as a few other friends who weren't in band. They'd had a typical first day instruction: the teacher introducing himself, going over rules and procedures, things like that. Now... at long last... lunch.

She took her tray, entered her student ID number at the cashier, then wandered outside to the back courtyard.

"Hey! Morticia! Over here!" Morticia looked around and saw Kaolin standing and waving. She joined her and Alphonse at a table near the door of the cafeteria.

"Hey, guys," Kaolin greeted after Morticia sat down. "How's your morning been?"

"Hectic, but good," Alphonse replied, starting to eat his fries. "I've only got one class with a band person, and that's fifth hour with Morticia."

"So far," said Kaolin. "I'm taking some sophomore classes and some junior classes. I'm in honors world history seventh hour."

"That's what I've got next," said Morticia.

"Cool! My first class with you!" said Kaolin, taking a bite of pizza.

"Hey, everybody!" said a voice. Leilani came over and sat next to Alphonse, across from Kaolin and Morticia.

"Oh, hey, Leila," Kaolin said. "What're you doing here? Don't you have class right now?"

"Not this year," Leilani replied. "They gave me sophomore lunch this year for some reason. All I've got are the required classes... and band, yo! Yes!" She made the rock on sign with her right hand, and Alphonse chuckled.

"That just sounded like Katrina or Shirogane," he said. "Not to be mean, but you're in orchestra. Different from marching band."

"Yeah, I know," said Leilani. "I'm carrying the banner, though!"

"Yes, true," said Alphonse. "However... I like playing this year's music. Danny Elfman is fun."

"I like This is Halloween," said Morticia. "It's got to be my favorite."

"Aw, you don't like Jump in the Line?" asked Kaolin.

"I like all of them, but I love This is Halloween," Morticia answered. "I just love the way the clarinets play it. It's fantastic."

"I've got to agree on that one," said Alphonse. "The clarinets and flutes sound really good."

"There is stuff both sections need to work on, though," said Kaolin. "Though I admit, we do sound pretty good..."

"Kaolin, let me ask you a question," said Leilani suddenly,

"Yeah?"

"Where in the hell did your parents get the name Kaolin? I mean, couldn't your parents have named you something normal, like Kathryn or Kaitlyn?"

"Three words: avid amateur geologist," Kaolin replied. "That would be my mother. She named me after kaolinite, which is a type of mineral, I think. She's kind of crazy, but I love her. My dad picked my middle name, which happens to be Amanda."

"Nice," said Leilani. "Just thought I'd ask; I've always thought your name was a little weird." She stood up. "Well, I'm going to leave you guys now, so... see you all later!"

"Bye, Leila!" said Morticia. Leilani smiled and wandered off.

"That girl is strange," said Kaolin. "I'll love her forever, but she's strange. Like, drumline strange. I wonder why she isn't in drumline..."

"She was," Alphonse replied. "Ed dated her last year. She was in drumline for the first half of last year and all the year before that. She dropped out because her mom didn't want her on percussion anymore. Apparently she was turning into a delinquent. So she went to orchestra because she already knew violin."

"Oh, yeah..." said Kaolin. "That's right... That's why she randomly went into orchestra.. I remember that. Okay, I remember now."

"Yeah," agreed Alphonse.

"Is Fullmetal dating anyone now?" Morticia asked.

"Fullmetal's your permanent nickname for him now, isn't it?" Alphonse asked, smiling.

"You bet!" Morticia replied. "He's going to have to learn to put up with us FMA fans! Anyway... is he?"

"We all know he's gay for Takenaga," said Kaolin, smiling. "The saxomaphone player's having a secret affair with the tromboner. It's classic."

"Very funny," Alphonse said good-naturedly. "Um... he's actually dating the other girl in drumline. Not Katrina, but the other one."

"Oh, Angelique?" Kaolin scowled. "Angelique... Koyara, or whatever her last name is?"

"Yeah," Alphonse replied. "The red-haired one who's always going around..."

"Like she knows everything," Morticia finished. "Preppy popular chick. I hate her. I swear to God she wants to get laid by every guy in school. What the hell is Fullmetal thinking? What does he see in her?"

"I'm not quite sure, I can't stand her either," said Alphonse. "She's started coming over a lot... She came over practically every week this past summer."

"The only reason he's dating her is because she's in drumline," said Kaolin. "If I know Ed, and God knows I do, he loves the drumline. Once he breaks up with Angelique, he's going to chase after Katrina. He's so predictable it's painful. No offense, Al; I don't mean to insult your brother. I know how close you guys are." Alphonse shrugged.

"I know," he said. "It doesn't matter. I don't exactly agree with the way Ed dates, either. So, um... what kind of music do you guys like?"

"Green Day!" Kaolin answered instantly. "Also known as the greatest band ever!"

"I must disagree on that one!" said Morticia. "Green Day's good, but Evanescence is the greatest ever!"

"Nope! Green Day!" said Kaolin.

"Evanescence!"

"Green Day!"

"Evanescence!"

"You know it's Green Day, so admit it!"

"Al, tell us... which is better?"

Alphonse's face turned thoughtful. "Well... let's see now. Green Day is best in punk or alternative rock or whatever it is, and Evanescence is best in gothic rock, soft metal... whatever it is. There you go."

"Yep, that's our Alphonse," said Kaolin. "Always making things equal and agreeable for everyone!"

"I try," said Alphonse.

"Hey, guys, time to get to class," said a security guard suddenly. "Lunch is over, let's go!"

"Aw!" said Morticia. "Just when I wanted to stay here for a bit... okay." They all got up, threw their trays away, and walked to the building.

"Where do you have to go, Al?" Kaolin asked.

"Study hall," Alphonse replied. "Don't know why, I didn't sign up for it, but whatever. See you guys later."

"Bye!" said Morticia. She and Kaolin separated from Alphonse.

"You know what I think?" said Kaolin as they walked down the hall.

"What do you think?" asked Morticia.

"I think Ed's only with Angelique to use her," Kaolin replied.

"Use her? What do you mean?"

"I mean that Ed only dates drumline girls to get on the good side of the guys. I know you weren't in band last year, so I'll tell you what I went on. Last year, he and Leila were going out, right? She was on drumline for a semester last year. He kept hanging out with the guys during marching season. He wouldn't stay with his own section at all except during parades and competition. He'd be with drumline all the time, but only when Leila was with him. He'd take her out on dates all the time, but instead of taking her out somewhere where it'd be just the two of them, he'd make her call up some of the guys so they could join them. He'd spend all the time with them and ignore her."

"That's rough," said Morticia.

"Yeah," Kaolin agreed. "Then get this: When Leila's mom forced her to leave drumline for orchestra, Ed broke up with her. It wasn't just an 'okay, this isn't working out, I have to break up with you' split. Ed got pissed off. He got pissed at her, and they ended up having a shouting match. He blew up in her face, going, 'I don't need some crappy orchestra chick for a girlfriend!' when he knew very well she could play violin when he first went out with her!"

"What the hell'd he do that for?" Morticia demanded.

"He took the drumline view," Kaolin answered. "Drumline hates orchestra because there's no marching drumline in orchestra; there's only xylophone and orchestra bells, and they aren't interested in that kind of percussion. They like stuff like the drumset. Perfect example: Katrina. Anyway, they've got nothing personal against the orchestra players themselves; they just don't like it. It's an old rivalry; been around for a long time. Anyway, Ed took it a bit too far. He started insulting Leila's personal character."

"What an ass!" Morticia cried.

"I know," agreed Kaolin. "Anyway, after he broke up with Leila, he moved on... straight to Caitlin."

"Caitlin? Why her?"

"She was a drum major last year, and she hung out with drumline a lot. She was genuine friends with them, though, unlike Ed. Anyway, he went out with her. They were fine for about a month, then Ed turned abusive."

"No way."

"Yeah. A push here, a shove there, he'd literally push her around until she'd do what he wanted. She was scared to death of him by the time pep band season started; even though she didn't show it, I could tell. Then one night, it got really bad. After the men's state championship basketball game, he took her over by the buses to where nobody could see them, and he beat the crap out of her."

"He beat her? But... she could take him on!"

"Yes, I know, but he told her that if she fought back, he'd kill her. I found her after he finished, and he'd dislocated her shoulder and gave her two black eyes, among other things. Luckily her shoulder was the worst injury. She was crying her eyes out. I've known Caitlin a long time, and that's the worst I've ever seen her."

"God..." Morticia murmured. "Poor Caitlin... Why'd he beat her up?"

"Apparently, from what she told me, he was mad because she wasn't conducting the right way. He told her she was a horrible drum major and that she was worthless and all this other crap, when he doesn't know anything about being a drum major."

"What the hell?!" Morticia exclaimed. "Caitlin's awesome!"

"I know," said Kaolin. "She slept in my hotel room with me. She didn't want to go to the drum majors' room or Ed's, so she stayed with me. I finally got her to get up the courage to admit she needed to break up with him. I then went and told him myself that she broke up with him."

"You said she hung out with drumline. Did they ever find out?"

"Oh yeah. It was not pretty. They were already mad at him about the way he treated Leila, but when they found out about Caitlin... they were furious. Not only because he took complete advantage of her and beat the crap out of her, but because she's a drum major. Now, drumliners have a huge amount of respect for the drum majors, and they get really pissed if anything bad happens to them. They got even more furious because she got beaten up. No drum major's ever gotten beaten up before, much less by someone in the band. So... they screwed up his instrument. He couldn't play it for the rest of the pep band season. Couldn't play it at the spring concert, either, and never figured out why. He ended up having to buy a whole brand-new saxophone. To this day, he doesn't know that drumline did it. Kyran got pissed, but it was drumline's revenge for Caitlin."

"Wow," said Morticia as they moved from Kaolin's locker and started walking down to hers. "Did Al know Fullmetal beat Caitlin up?"

"Al knew, all right," Kaolin replied. "Ed told him. He did something Ed hates himself for: He reported it."

"Wow... I can't envision him betraying his brother like that," said Morticia.

"I can't, but then again I can," said Kaolin. "If Al had just sat there and let Ed go unpunished, he would've felt guilty, and Caitlin might've been beaten up again for breaking up with him. I can't see Al just sitting there; he's too nice of a person. So, after Caitlin broke up with Ed, Al reported him to protect her. Ed had to take anger management, and since then, he's become way nicer. Still... even though I hate Angelique, I don't want to see her go through the same thing as Leila or, God forbid, Caitlin."

"I can see what you mean, and I feel the same way," Morticia agreed, shutting her locker after putting her geometry book in. "How'd Leila and Caitlin do?"

"Well, Leila was both pissed and sad at the same time," Kaolin replied, "because she was in love with him, but she eventually recovered and got over it. Caitlin... She ended up having to go see a psychologist and take meds to get over what happened. She was really depressed; she kept beating herself up over it and talking about suicide, how the world would be better if she wasn't alive and how it was her fault she got beaten up and that Ed was right and other stuff like that." Morticia nodded. She could sympathize with that -- she had had the same mentality last school year.

"You saw Shirogane Harukaiya at band camp, didn't you?" asked Kaolin. Morticia nodded again. Shirogane Harukaiya: a senior and the only Japanese boy on the drumline. Very nice... very polite... a decent drummer.

"What about him?" she asked.

"Well... he and Caitlin are really close," said Kaolin. "In short, Shiro's Caitlin's. He's the first one who found out that Ed beat her up... and he's always been extremely protective of her. After he found out, he got even more protective. She even tried to attempt suicide at his house, but he found her and stopped her. She hated him for it, but then she got wise later and thanked him for it. Those two are so close... He helped her more than the psychologist did, and now she's just fine. She's stopped seeing the psychologist, but she's still taking meds to keep the depression from coming back. She gets sad occasionally, but it's the normal-sad now instead of the serious clinical depression-sad."

"That's good," said Morticia.

"Yep... though in my opinion, they need to get into an actual, serious relationship. The entire drumline and most of the band knows Shiro's in love with her. I can tell she's in love with him, too. No offense meant to her, but she needs to get her head out of her ass and admit she loves him. Shiro just needs to go up and ask her out. Um..." She sighed. "So yeah. That's Ed's deal. Wow, I talk a lot."

They walked into their world history class. "Oh, Kaolin! Repeating my class, huh?" asked the teacher, a young man who looked in his early twenties.

"Hey, none o' that!" said Kaolin, smiling. "Isn't my fault I'm back here! Apparently a D has no credit!"

"Sorry, Miss Riverwing," said the teacher. "Have to pass with a C to get credit!"

"Aw, damn," said Kaolin. "But I had a 69! Couldn't you have just given me that one extra percent?"

"Nope, I'm sorry," said the teacher, smiling. "You didn't put in enough effort to get that extra percent."

"Sure I did," said Kaolin. "I participated!"

"Yes, I know," the teacher said. "However, if you took some of that participation and used it on your assignments, you might have gotten a higher grade." Kaolin rolled her eyes.

"Damn honors," she said to Morticia as they walked to their seats. "Always so strict! The teachers are _so_ mean... and the biggest meanie of them is Mr. Anderson!" Morticia looked at the teacher, who was smiling.

"You are such an ass, you know that?" she muttered. Kaolin grinned.

"Aw, Anderson knows I'm only playing!" she said. "It's because he _loves_ me."

"No affairs in school, Kaolin," Mr. Anderson said. "You should know that."

"So... I can't have an affair with my alto clarinet, then?" asked Kaolin. "But I suck a reed every day!"

"Band geek," said Mr. Anderson.

"Proud of it! Morticia's one, too!"

"Really? What do you play, Morticia?"

"Clarinet," Morticia replied. "I suck a reed, too!"

"Another band geek!" exclaimed Mr. Anderson. "Now I get to be entertained by even more band jokes, eh?"

"Yup! And you will love them!" answered Kaolin.

"Or surrender all your life's blood to _me_," Morticia added.

"Ooh, how _malicious_," Mr. Anderson said. "So... we have a vampire in our class now, do we? Bloodthirsty vampiric band geek. Interesting combination." Morticia bent her head and smiled.

"Oh, God, that's creepy, Morticia!" exclaimed Kaolin. "Stop smiling that way! It's creepy!" Morticia giggled and lifted her head as the bell to start class rang.


	3. Chapter 3

_**A/N: Guess what, everybody... I'm back! **_

**_I meant to post this a few days ago, but never got the chance to... gomen nasai! (I'm sorry)_**

_**I decided to have fun with this chappy.. let's see if you all can catch it!**_

_**Thank you for the reviews -- I look forward to more! **_

**_Okay, I'll shut up now and let you all read. Enjoy!_**

**_Wednesday_**

_**Chapter Three**_

"All right, you all need to have your parents sign the rules so I know that you read them," said Miss, or professoressa,

Farrelli in Morticia's eighth-period Italian II class. "Could somebody pass them out for me? Ah, signorina Hawkeye, could you

do it?"

"Sure," Morticia replied. She got up from her desk, took the papers from the teacher, and began to pass them out.

Her last class of the day: Italian II. Morticia had taken Italian I last year, and she had passed with flying colors, more

specifically a 116. She had had the highest grade in both Italian I classes (for the teacher taught two), and she was rather

proud of herself. The teacher, Ilaria Farrelli, was one of Morticia's favorite teachers, mainly because her personality was so

spastic, unique, and eccentric. Professoressa Farrelli, as she had her students call her, was a native of Italy, more specifically

Venice. She had a strong accent that Morticia thought was entertaining to listen to. She was the only teacher of both French

and Italian at the high school.

Morticia sat back down with her own set of notes.

"Grazie, signorina," said professoressa Farrelli.

"Yeps," Morticia replied.

"Long time no see, eh, Morticia?" asked Madeleine Lafayette, sitting next to her. Madeleine was a junior who played flute.

This was her second year of taking both French and Italian, and she was quite good at French.

"Yeah," Morticia replied. "How've you been?"

"Pretty good, pretty good," Madeleine replied. "Hey, check this out."

She pulled out a sheet of paper from her binder. Morticia took it and looked at it. It was headed _Full Names!_ and had a list of

names.

"Random much?" Morticia asked.

"Yeah... I got bored," said Madeleine. "I decided to randomly have everyone of the band geeks that I know well put their full

names down." Morticia nodded and started reading the different writings.

"Caitlin Alexandra?" she asked after a moment. "That's Caitlin's?"

"Yeah," said Madeleine. "I like it. Mine's Madeleine Arya."

"Cool," said Morticia. When she got to the bottom, she took out a pen and wrote:

_Morticia Kaydence Hawkeye_

She then gave the paper back to Madeleine.

"Wow, pretty handwriting," Madeleine commented. "Morticia Kaydence? I like that one, too! You've all got such pretty

names..."

_"Someone's_ in a preppy mood today," said Morticia. Madeleine looked at her.

"Shut up," she said flatly. "Isn't my fault. I'm always preppy when it's... _that time of the month."_

"Ah," said Morticia, understanding. "I getcha. I get all emo. Kind of sad, huh?" Madeleine nodded.

"Anyway..." she said. "What's up?"

"Nothing," Morticia replied. "Apparently Fullmetal's gay for Takenaga this year."

"Fullmetal?" Madeleine repeated, confused. After a moment, comprehension dawned on her face. "Oh, _Ed!"_ she said. She

giggled. "Who told you that?"

"Kaolin," Morticia answered. "We were talking about him at lunch, and she's all like, 'We all know he's gay for Takenaga!'"

"Kaolin says stuff like that," Madeleine said, smiling. "She's a bit perverted at times... but this is one of the times where I

agree with her. We think Ed's bi and Takenaga's gay. No real reason why... but we _have_ to have a gay couple in the band...

so it's Ed and Takenaga this year."

Morticia giggled. "Who was it last year?"

"Um..." Madeleine paused in thought. "Shirogane and Daniel. Even though it was blatently obvious Shiro was straight, we

got a _lot_ of laughs from thinking a drumliner would hook up with a drum major. Even though Shiro and Caitlin moreorless are

together... we found it hilarious to think of him and Daniel in a gay relationship."

"Very nice," said Morticia.

"Are you two working or just talking?" said professoressa Farrelli suddenly, looking up at them.

"We're talking about band," Madeleine replied. "It's _important."_

"Yeah," added Morticia. "It's about the field show."

She got smacked.

The End.


End file.
